This time, it was he who shook his head, groaning as he dropped his face onto the crook of his arm, which rested along the edge of the mantelpiece. “Oh Jemina, did you really believe that piece of fiction?” he asked, sliding a remorseful look at her.
Confused, and with a growing sense of foreboding, she stared at him, waiting for him to explain. A nervous tic worked at the side of his mouth, and he tapped his fingers on the tinderbox; the usual outward signs of agitation with Roderick. Finally, he rose and looked squarely at her. “For God’s sake, Jemima, it wasn’t a marriage in the eyes of the law. The parson wasn’t a real parson. I did what I felt I had to at the time in order to salvage the situation. Mama was in a fury at what she considered your manipulation of me. She said Papa would cut me off with no means of maintenance if I made you my wife, and I couldn’t risk that.”
It was difficult for Jemima to comprehend what he was saying. Not his wife? How could that be when she’d solemnly signed the marriage register? Well, the page that would be inserted into the register once it had been returned to the vestry after the fire that had damaged it. Tentacles of shock and dread were slowly curling through her. She had no words with which to respond.
Roderick made a sound like a growl. “I told Mama I would not let her threaten either you or me, or see your name tarnished when you were blameless. She told me you were trying to trick me, and that if I was so besotted, I could make you my…” his nostrils flared with distaste as he repeated the words, “mistress. Mama said she’d continue to see my allowance paid if I only pretended to go through a marriage with you. She said I’d have plenty of opportunity later to do the right thing by you if I insisted, but that she’d not countenance me rushing into anything so peremptory.”
Numbly, Jemima opened her mouth, but no words came. Her lips seemed to be frozen. Like her heart, only that was stirring to life like a cold, clammy snake slowly uncurling in her breast, slowly coming to life.
Her breath came out like the final gust of a dying woman. “So you listened to your mother when you duped me. I’m not your wife? I’m your…” She couldn’t even say the word. The sobs were starting to rise in her throat. She began to pace. She didn’t think she could bear much more. A moment earlier, she’d been cold caused first, by the poor excuse for a fire and then her horror. Now heat was beginning to rage within her. She tried to keep her voice even, restrain the hysteria. “So what am I to do? Where am I to go…if I’m not your wife and you can’t afford to keep me?”
“Hush, Jemima. Not so shrill.” He stared nervously at the wall that separated them from their neighbor. “I hoped you had family and if you do, then, of course I’ll help you with the journey to return to them.”
“Ruined! You expect me to find my family? I needed to get to St. Paul’s churchyard because it represented salvation. It was my only chance to be taken up by…someone who would not take advantage of me!” She glared at him and he looked away. He had nothing to offer her except further humiliation.
What of her aunt and cousin? They’d take her back. They were good, loving people. Surely his lordship, despite his threats, could do them no harm? To make certain, she’d give Lord Griffith the tablet in return for their safety. Maybe he would, in fact, be as good as his word and give her half the bounty.
Then she contemplated the shame. Yes, her aunt and cousin were kind, but her niece was about to make her coming-out. For the past three months, Jemima had lived in sin. She was ruined. What if the scandal were discovered and spoiled Lucy’s marriage prospects?
“Then if you can’t go home to family, you’ll need someone else to protect you. You’re obviously not trained to work in any capacity.”
“Except as a governess.” She dropped her head as she tried to think about her future and not her dreadful past, but she jerked it back up at his obvious discomfort when he said, “My mother is vengeful, and truly believes you tried to trick me.” He shifted awkwardly beneath her horrified stare. “She says she’ll ensure you find no respectable position.” He c
leared his throat and put out his hand. “Jemima, I…don’t know how to put this, but my mother seems to have formed some irrational hatred of you. She believes you insinuated yourself into our household for the sole reason of enticing me into marriage. She says she can’t in good conscience allow another family to nurture such a designing female. Her words, Jemima,” he added defensively. “No, I think it will be difficult for you to find work as a governess. I’m sorry…but if you won’t return to family, I have an alternative.”
It appeared Jemima’s dislike of Mrs. Graves had been more than returned. Dangerously so. She took a quavering breath. “So you’ve been plotting this moment for some time?” Somehow this felt worse even than his initial betrayal. “You’ve found an alternative. An alternative that will benefit you, no doubt.”
He ignored her, his voice gaining confidence as he spoke. “Do you remember a week ago when I left you for the day, and you remarked upon my appearing feverish after I returned?”
She nodded. She remembered it well. She’d been furious when she’d seen in his stained shirt cuffs and slurred words the signs of a night of dissipation while she’d been alone; starved for occupation.
He sighed, though he didn’t look as repentant as she thought he ought. “The reason was, I’d lost an enormous sum over a cockfight. I don’t know what possessed me. I hadn’t the means to repay the wager, and a gentleman who does not pay his gambling debts is forever persona non grata. I couldn’t ask my father for assistance. He wouldn’t have had the means, besides.” His voice trailed off. “Then salvation came to me in a most unexpected way.”
Jemima looked at him, inquiry breaking through her anger when his words wouldn’t come. “You won the money back?”
“No, I was made an offer. The most difficult offer I’ve ever contemplated.” He grew restless, moving to the fireplace to kick at the coals, not looking at her as he went on. “A gentleman, far richer than I could ever hope to be, accosted me as I was walking home. He said he had a proposition for me.”
“A friend?” Jemima had no idea where this was going.
“An acquaintance. Some days previously, I’d been in my cups and…well…I don’t remember saying it, but this gentleman reminded me that, alas, I had confessed I’d entered into a sham marriage. I think someone else had brought up the subject, and…I’m sorry, Jemima, I have no idea what possessed me, but apparently I revealed it while at my club.”
“Dear God, so I am, in fact, the last to know!”
“So this gentleman, Lord Deveril,” he went on hurriedly, ignoring her, “said he’d been intrigued to see how a sapskull like me—his words, and I don’t deny the truth of them—could entice a woman possessed of the grace and beauty I’d described, to enter into any kind of union with me.”
Jemima kept silent, though her thoughts ran riot.
“I didn’t know it, but he passed by shortly afterward when I led you out of the house to go driving. A day later, he asked me to bring you to Madame Plumb’s—so he could meet you in person. Tonight he approached me when we were leaving, and said you had…bewitched him.” Roderick spoke briskly now. “Lord Deveril proposed that he would pay my gaming debt if I were prepared to give you up.”
Jemima stared at him, uncomprehending. “Give me up? To him? To Lord Deveril? A man I don’t even know? What do you mean, give me up? To be his…what?” she finished shrilly, barely able to comprehend the awfulness of what was proving ever more difficult to grapple with than the fact she’d been living in sin.
“You need a protector, Jemima, and I stand to lose everything.” Roderick moved swiftly toward her and took her arm.
“Not as much as I have to lose!” she returned, shaking him off. “Not as much as I have lost! How can you do this to me? How can I do this? What are you asking of me?”
Roderick stared at her silently, then took a pinch of snuff. He’d tried so hard to be the gentleman his father hadn’t been, but like their marriage, he was a sham. “Truly, Jemima, if there were any other way, perhaps through honest employment, I would help you and hope my mother didn’t find out.” He offered her an appeasing smile. “It would aid me greatly if you would agree…bearing in mind that you are already ruined.”
Jemima stepped back slowly until she reached the wall, shock stealing her words as she continued to stare at Roderick.